As she looked at her beloved husband, Julie felt like she had finally found the last piece to make her life whole; in the brief moment that she stood there, a strange nostalgic love burned inside of her, the few hours that they stayed apart from each other - although at the same house - seemed like lifetimes, she reasoned that this was so because her husband was taking part in that still quiet war when things were getting more dangerous by the second regarding the common people and the crown.

But her worry washed away completely when facing the man she loved the most, he was fine and that was what mattered to her; she also knew that his sense of duty would not let him give up something he started this easy, even more, when things were apparently at what appeared to be a critical point.

"I'm back, my love." Andrew appeared have missed her as much as she did him.

And without waiting another moment go to waste, Julie quickly embraced Andrew, as soon as their chests were touching each other in a tight hug, she swiftly kissed him. But that was for just a brief moment, none of the two wanted to go any further in front of Anna, but she still kept embracing her husband. Noses and foreheads greeting each other intimately, as if to tell how much one was missing the other. Julie felt Andrew's relieved and anxious breath in her skin and she was sure he felt her's too.

But as much as she wanted to keep this close of a contact, this was not their heated youth anymore, she finally released Andrew and he also let go of her. He turns to see Anna and calls for her. "Come here, sweetie!" Andrew then extended his hands beckoning for her to come; and sure enough, Anna ran and jumped and fell right into his hands.

Holding her by her armpits, Andrew played with Anna. By throwing the child as close to the ceiling as he could and getting hold of her when she fell back down; there's no need to say that Julie - who almost fainted when seeing this - was extremely against her husband's methods to have fun. Anna seemed to like it, though, so Julie was forced to watch without knowing what to say.

The three of them enjoyed the moment while the adults forgot the problems plaguing them, those worries were better left at a time when they both were free to solve them.

Night came and Anna was sent to sleep, but instead of bickering and making a fuss in her bed like she usually did, she fell asleep as soon as she laid in it. Julie decided to talk with her daughter about not sleeping when told to for tomorrow.

the couple went to their own bed right after, but none of the two was able to sleep, worry filled the heart of the woman and guilt haunted the mind of the man.

"What happened at the meeting?" Julie was looking at the ceiling of the bed with a tired expression, if there were any candles lit in the bedroom, her eyes would probably be shining with small tears by how bad she felt when she wanted answers for what her love was going through even though she wouldn't be able to do anything with them.

"We're going to act pretty soon, I'll need to bother you again with your writing." Andrew's expression was hard to see with only the moonlight passing through the curtains of that boring window to illuminate his silhouette. But Julie somehow knew he was feeling as bad as her, if not worse.

"No, it's no trouble. Thanks to you, I have people to read what I write, what I believe." She tries to comfort her husband, although those words were the truth, the way she was slowly self-destructing herself when the one she loved was virtually on the front lines of this hell was more than enough to completely drown her timid pride and sense of accomplishment.

Perhaps because of her question, or maybe because of another reason that was so complicated that none of the two could understand, the married couple felt too tired to do anything but look at the ceiling of the bed the rest of the night. The only solace Julie could find to not cry in front of her beloved was that at least this depressing mood had not affected little Anna, who was as happy as she ever was. 

At the dead of the night, when the silence rules. When rain struck the strong roof with anger and muffled the breath of the pitiful. Darkness finally consumed the sight protected by the fading moonlight.

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"Take care out there, dear." Now that Andrew heard his wife say this, he thought jokingly about how something that could only be taken as 'Have a good day.' seemed to have a pretty literal meaning now. With famine and misery spreading from the lower to middle classes of the kingdom, any nobles and merchants that don't pay attention to their safety can be easily assaulted or have their homes ransacked.

"I'll be back soon, my love." With this funny irony in mind, Andrew entered one of the carriages of his family and went to the noble district of the capital. There he had a meeting with his friend, the only person he truly trusted that was not part of his family.

After a couple hours, he reached his destination. The roads which have been built according to the need and were never really planned spread randomly through every block more like a nest of snakes than spiderwebs on the wall. A small number of carriages could be seen traveling on the roads or parked to the side of the street. Every building screamed money and called for attention, even though the entire country was passing through a crisis certain nobles didn't seem to care about their own clear lack of money. 

Andrew's carriage stopped by the street and he got off of it, heading to the plaza that was not much far away from him. There, he found his friend, the man was blankly looking at the teacup in front of him. But this strange habit could not hide the true upbringing of the person, his back was straight, no frown or wrinkles could be seen on his well-cared skin that had just reached its thirties, the position of the man's legs and arms also spoke much about his mastered etiquette.

As Andrew approached the man, his presence was acknowledged by a light wave of his friend's hand, implying for him to take a seat that was just opposite of the noble. Andrew did just as was asked of him and sat, but he waited for the other person to start the conversation. Sure enough, after a few seconds, he looked away from his tea and spoke to Andrew.

"Good day, my friend Andrew. Now, would you please tell this old friend of yours what you see when looking at these people?" He asks while letting one of his hands travel half a circle around him, almost as if welcoming a guest and asking him for his opinion on the house.

The focus of the man's sight, however, was the other nobles. They calmly walked through the sidewalk while looking around the restaurants and jewelry stores, some had only the company of a butler or servant while others were having some friendly talk with their friends or lovers. However, - probably because Andrew's friend drew his attention to the fact - after a few moments, Andrew realized that only a few of the already low number of nobles were actually buying something really expensive from those shops; if this was in the past, strange would be to see a day where a single one of these rich people actually left a shop without wasting enough money to sustain a family of peasants for a decade. No need to say that this was somewhat comical for the currently distracted merchant.

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"Pleasure meeting you, Neutral. As for them... they seem to be... ignoring their own situation? Perhaps - considering the crisis we're facing - simply faking all of this?" Andrew answered with what appeared to be more of a guess than a straightforward answer, which was not much strange considering that he never really understood the nobles' need to throw everything they got in the trash instead of investing it on more ways to make a profit.

"A little of the two." Said the man named Neutral, as calm as ever. "They are trying to ignore the fact that we are running out of money when they come and take a look around all those shops, they are faking the fact that they have no money when they enter a shop and look the wares for half an hour before saying that nothing picked their interest instead of admitting that they can't afford anything." He observes, creating a vivid image in Andrew's head about true hypocrisy, the vendors expectantly explaining all of their best products and giving their all to barter a more accessible price just to hear the lie that always said the same thing, 'The quality is far too poor.' It suddenly became easier to accept the fact that the uprising could seriously damage the balance of power in the country.

"This makes me wonder. When they refused to pay taxes to the king, what did they answer?" Andrew suddenly wanted to find yet more reasons to strike that weak and huge system that is known as Monarchy.

"Just as you must be expecting, 'This action is below beings of such a higher position.' Always the same boring excuse." Neutral simply says, making it clear that the nobles are not exactly the main focus of this for their talk today.

"So, where are you in this situation?" The merchant asks, already making some short hypothesis about his friend's reason for this discussion.

"I'm but a single, imperceptible gear inside the clockwork machine, far too tired to go against the 'flow' of every other - larger or smaller - gear." He answers, looking once again at his now empty teacup as if seeing the liquid that was not there anymore; its 'flow', as Neutral seemed to put it, would go in circles, just like his clockwork image. 'Is he talking about cycles?' Andrew guessed but still waited expectantly about his vision of the 'machine'.

And Andrew's expectations were fulfilled as Neutral went to explain his view of things; how everything works in a cycle, composed of multiple forces fighting against each other over the eras, changing names, sometimes ideologies, but always fighting the same war of agonizing attrition that ended by mutual destruction and creation of new forces that were antagonistic to each other. Differently from Andrew's thoughts and the normal 'the world moves in a never-ending, vicious cycle', though, for Neutral, the cycles were finite, this would be proven by the fact that although the forces always destroyed each other over time, by the passing of time itself the ideology of the forces that protected the interest of the major population started to become stagnant, more focused and less moldable... massive, even.

As for what that could entail, Andrew didn't need an explanation for that, he was seeing it with his own eyes. The majority, also depicted as the weakest in power, was fighting a direct, brutal war. Everywhere around the country, nobles and merchants that were friendly to the king and other nobles were being targeted, having their houses ransacked and destroyed, some even ended up assassinated by the populace. Different from what happened to the Ancient Empire, which was ruined by plagues, invasions, famine, and corruption; the monarchy of today was being destroyed by its own people; corruption, famine and everything else was simply the reason for the majority to act.

"But... since everything is part of a whole machine, can't you somehow throw a wrench in the cogs?" Andrew asked, his mind retracing every event that has happened during this uprising. He reached the strange conclusion that this uprising was not only at its decisive moment but also highly unstable, so much so that by taking the smallest step against the populace, the rotten tree that was the monarchy could be instantly toppled, that being the main reason why Andrew's father was on his side.

"Not necessarily, we're all but a minuscule gear, turning by the sheer force of the machine's workforce. Only the creator can use the tools; we, however, can go against the machine, start to turn backwards - against the 'flow' of every other cog - and potentially change the purpose of said machine. But for that, one would probably need the power of other cogs with such intentions, a number which, unfortunately, is hard to find in the same era."

"But if the possibility of going against the rules are so low, why even consider it?" Andrew lost a bit of hope when hearing Neutral's answer. The noble, however, shook his head at Andrew's reaction.

"Merchant, you're asking the wrong questions. Instead of giving up when finding the first wall, why don't we search for another way out?" He said with a patient smile, eyes entering Andrew's wandering mind, locking it and sending it the right way.

"The cycle is finite, only our poor minds that cannot see what is beyond the stars would think otherwise." Andrew mumbled what he thought to be the core of Neutral's philosophy. "Are you saying that the 'machine' is fated to fall by itself?"

To this, the noble nodded, his eyes once again looking at his empty teacup while he said with unbelievable certainty, almost as if he could see the future of eras that have yet to come. "Alone, we may not be able to turn the system backwards, but we can at least - one at a time and for a brief moment - stop it completely, damaging it in the process. My advice to you today, my friend, is to find a way to do exactly that, to go beyond just 'saving your people because it's the right thing to do' and give humanity a true way out, before it manages to kill itself."

Andrew only felt more at a loss when hearing that. Honestly, when he knew and heard nothing things were so easy to figure out. But then again, finding the easiest way to live, as the saying of Arcas goes, 'is just human nature'.

After some time of more debates in that belief of 'clockwork', Andrew decided to relay his decision surrounding the uprising to Neutral and ask for a favor from the noble, he was to find any additional information on their target and use any means possible to ensure their success with little casualties on their side. With matters taken care of, Andrew bid the noble goodbye and returned to his carriage to head back home.

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Inside his carriage, Andrew was deep in thought, not about Neutral's way of seeing the world, but thinking about how to deal with his sanity problems. As the luxury carriage's walls twitched and closed in on him like a thirsty throat, a formless voice, not male nor female, screeched at his ears, the 'voice' in question didn't exist but tore away at the merchant's heart nonetheless. "Your fault!" It screamed. "Who do you think you are?!" It snorted.

Just stop already! Andrew roared inside his mind, for him, these illusions were not just some false reality that came to be because he had blood that he didn't want on his hands, it was his ever so missing sanity wailing, blaming him for his own situation, his own sickness.

His arms, legs, and spine started to twitch uncontrollably; sweat falling like rain through his back and forehead; his eyes, moving from one side to the other like the head of some chicken, couldn't focus on a single place inside the seemingly living walls of the carriage for more than a second; his back started itching like crazy and before Andrew knew it, he was already scratching himself all over the place.

"How many more people have to die by your hands before you've had enough?!" It kept screaming nonstop as a headache formed on the haunted merchant's head, his subconscious begged in the most horrific ways for him to stop hurting his own sanity, even though he never was completely sane to begin with.

I just need to calm down, it'll go away, soon. I... I just need to see Julie, and everything will end. Andrew reassured himself, as his ragged breath tasted like iron in his throat, his ears rang with that agonizing, formless voice that screeched at him, cursing and blaming, threatening and insulting.

And pretty much like that, the inside of the carriage heading back to the merchant family's home was filled with silent self-blaming, madness, and a man, pressuring his own head in silent suffering as if holding at whatever dear he had in life.

It wasn't like that in the past, way back when his ignorance spared him from the truth of his way of life. But that was then, and this is now.